Chapter 5: The Guidebook and the Gravestone

As I slam my head into the Gravestone for the umpteenth time, I consider possible questions others could assault me with to pass the time.

You have sustained damage from colliding against a 〖Gravestone〗!HP - 6Your HP has fallen to 0!⟨True Death Count⟩’s Death Count has risen to 4DeathsYou have been revived at Lv.1!

“Why would you do something so rash when you wouldn’t even try out Commands?” — for one. To which, my answer would be “Because this takes precedence”.

I had mentioned that there was something related to 「Quantitative Menu」 that I didn’t understand yet. To elaborate, I didn’t (and still don’t) know whether the information provided by 「Quantitative Menu」 will turn out to be true.

Obviously, because I’m still “alive”, the part about my revival through ⟨True Death Count⟩ is true… But there’re simply too many unknowns beside that. And I dislike unknowns.

Still, I’m not equipped to uncover all the mysteries that 「Quantitative Menu」 holds, so I figure that I might as well start off simple. My first test: how well I’ll resist the debuffs listed in the Skill ⟨True Death Count⟩.

I have Soul resistances, sure… But in some games % resistances don’t add on to one another; instead, they simply apply to one another. In other words, my case of 50% resistance through two Skills could be “One 50%” and “one 50% of 50%”, totaling 75%. There’s also the possibility that “resistance” is actually “The chance to resist the given attribute”.

Then, there’re the mystery of whether Resistances apply to Debuffs. It was becoming increasingly uncommon in more recent games on Earth, but games that had things like “Poison: Element” and “Poison: Debuff” each with their own respective resistances did exist.

But, of course, I don’t plan on bashing my head in until ⧼Soul Damage Ⅴ⧽ is applied, as that would take too much time. Instead, I’ll simply reach ⧼Soul Damage Ⅰ⧽ and see what happens. If the debuff applies, I’ll decide whether I should continue living while avoiding death, or whether to finish myself off.

If the Debuff is resisted, then I’ll decide whether to continue testing for higher levels of the Debuff (perhaps with a more efficient method of death), or…

… Ah. I’m getting ahead of myself.

Going back to the reason I’m not trying out any Commands, it’s mainly for the sake of time efficiency. If I were to go unconscious due to a variable I’m unaware of then I would only be wasting time knocked out. For dying and having my soul eroded, however, I know what happens. Or… What should happen, at least. And because I know what should happen, I’m not afraid of the result, nor do I think investigating the subject is a waste.

If soul damage applies and I have to be reborn into a new “shell” (whether due to some system put in place to preserve the integrity of the soul, or perhaps a different reason) then it’s fine because I’ll leave this cheat-like body behind.

If I’m damaged and become a “regular” Soul instead of a “Strong” soul — losing my memories and being tossed about at the mercy of Charon’s Boatmen like many others — then it’s fine because I was prepared to lose “myself” back on Earth anyways.

If the result is simply my soul being whittled away bit by bit, or if I feel intense pain like I did on Charon’s ship, then that’s also an acceptable result — albeit one that would take a while to end up as a situation mentioned prior.

In all of those situations, even if I did test out Skills, it would have been nothing but a waste of time. What use is knowing the usage of Skills if I would only use them for a short amount of time? It would be similar to paying money for a game demo, only to never buy the full game. Why would I bother wasting my “money” on such a thing?

You have sustained damage from colliding against a 〖Gravestone〗!HP - 6Aux. RES + 1

Moving on from the reason for my self-harm, perhaps I should turn my thoughts towards the information I gained post second-death.

After my second death (not the first, as I wanted to confirm that the first revival wasn’t some “Beginner’s Grace”) I consulted the Guidebook for a short time. Unlike testing Commands, doing so would give some reliable insight on how resistances apply, among other things.

While the possibility of Charon’s book being inaccurate did cross my mind, in the end I chose to take a chance. Despite the short amount of time I interacted with the Greater God of Souls, he didn’t seem like the type who lied… And believing that this book wasn’t written by Charon would be nothing but paranoia. Thus, I read.

No matter how many times I scanned through the long-winded explanations, however, Charon’s depictions of Resistances was only to the extent of “they lessen the effects”. He had also written that they’re extremely difficult to obtain, which leads me to believe his half-baked explanation was simply because he didn’t imagine I’d obtain so much resistance.

As for other subjects of immediate interest, there was no mention of Revival or Soul Deterioration.

While it’s possible I simply missed the appropriate information, I don’t think that’s actually the case, seeing as the Guidebook is just that: A Guidebook for a new world. An outline, at best, to describe the System and inhabitants of Ariot.

You have sustained damage from colliding against a 〖Gravestone〗!HP - 5Your HP has fallen to 0!⟨True Death Count⟩’s Death Count has risen to 5DeathsYou have been revived at Lv.1!

Even if I only scanned over most subjects, it should have been expected that such a guide wouldn’t contain details related to revival and soul damage. It could be considered a tourists guide with a highly obnoxious writer. Or perhaps it would be a written work meant to enter a word-count championship of sorts.

Well, the fact that it was written that way only reinforces my suspicion that Charon didn’t expect me to be involved with “Revival” or any form of “Soul Damage” — in other words, it gave me even more reason to be suspicious of my situation.

But other than those subjects, the Book did contain a great deal of knowledge.

You have sustained damage from colliding against a 〖Gravestone〗!HP - 5

For example, when I was scanning through the “Commands” category, I verified that I could safely activate my “Semi-Passive” Skills without worrying about odd repercussions not mentioned by 「Quantitative Menu」.

Sure enough, activating the Semi-Passive Skills didn’t result in any unwanted visits to dreamland, so finding information about them was a pleasant coincidence. Even if ⧼Soul Damage Ⅰ⧽ is put into effect and my soul withers away, the time needed to activate those Skills was and still is permissible.

— Before the next message from the system pops up, I already send the “feeling” to close it preemptively.

These Windows are a side-effect of 「Quantitative Menu」 I’ve come to realize. They’re likely just the “visualization” of Variable changes, and so, going by that logic I can technically intercept the messages as they flow from my psyche. In other words, I’ve found the “secondary OFF switch”.

It requires my full attention to do so, but there isn’t much else to think about as I bludgeon my head with slabs of stone.

…

Now then… What to think about next…?

Ah, perhaps “What about the explanation of Commands from the book?” — Hitting my head once again against the gravestone, I proceed to ask from the perspective of my mental conversational partner. That is to say, my “talk” with no one in particular.

As mentioned previously, I skimmed through the information, so I likely don’t understand everything related to that subject — nor do I plan to until the current test is complete. For the information I scavenged through walls of writing, however, I may as well review.

I’ll start with Commands in general.

Commands are just as they sound — functions given to the world system and made a reality. “Command” is simply a term used for Spells, Skills, and Abilities of all kinds — a sort of “all of the above” word if you will. Of course, those three types are quite different, so I’ll explain each in order.

Spells come in 4 types, with 2 Archetypes. The 4 types are Active, Semi-Passive, Buff/Debuff, and Heal. The 2 Archetypes are Singular and Area-Wide.

In detail:

Active = “A Spell whose effects are put into play immediately after the cast is finished”

Semi-Passive = “A Spell whose effects aren’t immediately prevalent, with a high immediate MP cost, and a low maintain-state MP cost. These Spells are usually multiple-staged with “Activated” “Active” and “Deactivated” effects.”

Buff/Debuff = “A Spell whose main effect is to grant a Buff/Debuff of some kind”

Heal: “A Spell whose main effect is to restore the Status Variables (most notably HP) of the target”

For the Archetypes — Singular and Area-Wide: they’re self explanatory.

Singular Spells are made to target a single target. Area-Wide Spells are made to target multiple targets, and/or affect a wide area.

You can use “Singular” spells to hit multiple targets if the Spell is large enough, however. The Archetypes depict the number of Targets needed to Cast, not the amount of individuals capable of being hit. In other words, Singular Spells require 1 Target, Area-Wide Spells require more than 0 Targets.

Area-Wide may seem incredibly flexible in terms of the number of Targets, but it was written that there are usually many Spell restrictions, so rather than “All Area-Wide Spells can be cast with ≥0 Targets” it’s more “Each Area-Wide Spell has its own specific number of Targets needed”. As an aside, the most common amount of Targets for Area-Wide Spells is supposedly 1. Mh.

Moving on: all Spells cost MP, with a couple of exceptions. I believe the example given by Charon of one such exception was ⦑Blood Orb⦒: a Spell that uses HP to cast.

Dark, sacrificial magics with haunting chants and hooded figures comes to mind with the name, but it’s probably quite different in practice. Probably.

For Skills, they come in the 3 kinds: Active, Semi-Passive, and Passive. They all act as one would usually expect from games, making me once again question whether the creators of this world made a real planet or an MMORPG. Slamming my head against the slightly-cracked gravestone clears any suspicions, however.

Active = “An action with effects applied” ⟨Speed Reading⟩ is an example of this type.

Semi-Passive = “A Passive Skill that can be turned ON or OFF, with effects differing depending on the State. Some S/P Skills have effects which are applied all the time” ⟨Oracle’s Eye⟩ is an adequate example.

Passive = “A Skill whose effects are always present — so long as the user continues to meet the Skill’s Prerequisites, of course” ⟨The Choice of the True Dead⟩ is a Passive with an odd prerequisite, but Charon had written that a lot of Passives have prerequisites along the lines of “do x action for y amount of time”. Like “take Fire attribute damage worth y points of damage” for ⟨Fire Resistance⟩

The Skills I have applied right now are all the Passives (which would be applied regardless of my will), and the Semi-Passive Skills: ⟨Oracle’s Eye⟩, ⟨Auger’s Sigil⟩, ⟨The True Dead’s Casting⟩, ⟨Undead Sense⟩, ⟨Life Sense⟩, and ⟨Reflective Mind⟩.

Those last three are quite interesting, actually. Their purposes are to boost ⟨Detect Undead⟩, ⟨Detect Life⟩, and ⟨Heightened Contemplation⟩ respectively; they also automatically re-apply their respective Commands whenever their Duration expires. In other words, they’re convenient Skills that turn Actives into “ersatz Passive Skills”. They each have prerequisites along the lines of “Use [Command] x times”, in all cases x ≥ 500, but because they’re related to Commands I was blessed with, those prerequisites were removed.

Do I feel guilty about cutting such tedious requirements? Not at all.

Considering my Lifespan is literally ∞, I’d eventually unlock them — provided my soul isn’t eroded and this explanation isn’t just a horrid waste of time.

Last but not least, Abilities are something akin to a copy of Skills. They have Active, Semi-Passive, and Passive, but there’s also the “Unknown” category.

「Quantitative Menu」 belongs to that category, but I don’t see much of a difference between it and Semi-Passive Skills other than the fact that it has a wide range of utility.

Abilities are irregular despite being so similar to Skills, however. The reason is simple: they aren’t mentioned in Charon’s Guidebook among Commands, but rather a different section I had scanned through. Specifically:

“Monsters”

It turns out that Active, Semi-Passive, and Passive Abilities are really just “Monster Skills”. The Unknown category is still as enigmatic as its own name, but it might just be a category used for “Commands that don’t fit in other categories”, so I digress.

Still, what a shock I had finding out that Zombies weren’t a Mortal Soul Race! — is not even close to how I felt.

While I considered it a possibility that Zombies were a non-Monster race, that was, at best, only a fleeting thought without any real belief. My main impression was that they were Monsters to begin with, simply due to my bias from Earth. That bias turned out to be appropriate, thus my lack of surprise.

But back to the topic of Abilities, the largest difference they have from Skills is that they use something written by Charon as “Core Energy” rather than “Proficiency”.

“Core Energy” is likely “Core EXP” which showed up on 「Quantitative Menu」. Core EXP was also mentioned upon analyzing my Abilities’ information, in the area where the PS equation should have been.

For example, I’ll bring up one of my Abilities that came for free as a result of my Race, 「Zombie Physique」:

Rⅰ

[Zombie Physique Lv.1]

!!!ERROR: SYSTEM FILES CORRUPTED. CANNOT DISPLAY D://3S.C!!!

Receives Proficiency From:Core EXP can be distributed at a Ratio of 1C:1C Core EXP to「Zombie Physique」

Affects:Gaining Auxiliary VIT will become 1% easierGaining Auxiliary RES will become 1% easier+50.5% proficiency in Dark and Death attributes+100% resistance to Dark and Death attributed damage & effects-99.5% resistance to Light and Holy attributed damage & effectsLifespan will be increased to ∞/∞SP will be increased to ∞/∞Satiety will be increased to ∞/∞The User will become 100% resistant to all DoT damage & effects This effect does not include damage & effects from the Holy and Light attributesThe User will become 99% less resistant to all DoT damage & effects from the Holy and Light attributesThe User will become 1% more resistant to all Debuffs in the Mental category of all levelsThe User will become 1% more resistant to all Debuffs in the Physical category of all levelsThe User will become immune to the Debuffs: ⧼Physically Fatigued⧽ and ⧼Mentally Fatigued⧽ of all levelsThe User will become immune to the Status: [Unconscious]The User will become 0.5% more resistant to the Status: [Sanctified]The User will become 0.5% more resistant to the Status: [Manipulated]The User will become immune to the Sense: {Pain} This effect can be toggledAs a Racial Ability, these effects cannot be removed.

Prerequisites for the use of the Ability:The User’s Race must be categorized as a 【Zombie】

CS = (100 * S)Command Progress: 0C/ 100C

Before I continue, although that Description might make one fear the wrath of the Gods, I’m honestly not surprised.

I was a bit shocked at first, of course, but upon looking through my other Abilities (with the exception of 「Quantitative Menu」) I noticed that all of my Monster-originating Abilities have that same description; thus, I believe that the “Error” is simply from the fact that Monsters shouldn’t be able to see System Variables in a way that a Mortal Soul could.

Add another point to the “my rebirth is abnormal” scoreboard! — isn’t something that I shouted out mentally; in fact, that thought never even occurred.

Now getting back to the Ability… I must say: I’ve been born into quite the cheat-like race.

This Ability is supposedly the default for 【Zombies】, but really, it doesn’t fall far behind the cheat-like ⟨The Choice of the True Dead⟩ in my opinion. Plus, these are only the specs for Lv.1. What if this Ability goes to Lv.100? Or even Lv.1,000?

If Zombies were intelligent I have no doubt they’d be able to form the strongest defensive Race in existence. Looking at my Level INT of 0 I highly doubt such a thing would ever occur naturally, however.

Zombies were written about by Charon in the “Monsters” category quite shortly — which is to say only a couple paragraphs as opposed to several pages. To sum his explanation up, Zombies are very resilient, but also very, very stupid.

Extremely stupid.

He wrote so much about their stupidity that I had to mention it twice.

But I’ve strayed off topic.

I’m hypothesizing that CS is “Core EXP required for Something” just like how PS is “Proficiency required for Something”. I still don’t know what that “something” really is, but I don’t need to know currently, especially if I end up disappearing due to soul damage.

“So, just what is Core EXP, then?”

To properly understand, one has to know what a Core is. Charon’s Book mentioned them, and I had read through the section for a perfectly legitimate reason. A “Core” is simply a “Monster Core”, and Monster Cores are the physical manifestation of “Monster Souls”.

That is what piqued my interest.

I’m a Mortal Soul. I’m certain, because Charon had written so in his initial letter, and also because of the description Charon gave Monster Souls. I believe it was something along the lines of “Souls shattered and deformed by the Mad God”, but I experienced nothing of the sort.

That being the case, Charon’s description of what a Core is was incorrect. The fact that he misunderstood the fact that Monster Cores required Monster Souls doesn’t have much impact, however. I’ve already come to peace with the fact that his depictions were either given without full knowledge, or were written with the general beliefs of Ariot in mind.

Anyways, as a Monster grows, its Core becomes bigger and/or more dense. But they can’t just grow out of nowhere. A Monster Core grows by absorbing Ether. Monsters can supply this Ether via the surrounding air, feeding off of Mortal Shells left without a Mortal Soul, or consuming other Monster Cores.

Naturally I can do such things as well.

The Command that allows absorption of Ether is an Ability aptly named 「Ether Absorption」, which is paired up with 「Ether Dispersion」. Both are Semi-Passive Abilities without levels — and thus without “growth”. They can supposedly be modified, judging by their Ability boxes, however. I’m not sure of the usual method of modification, but through 「Quantitative Menu」 I can change the values of absorption/dispersion using a slider. How convenient.

For the specifics: when「Ether Absorption」is active a Monster becomes capable of collecting Ether. Mh. It really does just as its name suggests. Shocking, I know.

As an aside, Ether is known as “Miasma” to most Races simply because Mortal Shells show no changes towards Ether unless it’s considerably dense. In fact, they can’t even make use of Ether, making me wonder exactly what Ether is. Anyways, “Miasma” was coined as a term depicting a sort of “fog” formed when Ether grows incredibly dense; it supposedly has negative effects on Mortal Shells.

I only know that information because the only way to retain my sanity while reading Charon’s notes was to latch onto “interesting” information. If I went mad, I wouldn’t be able to kill myself very efficiently, would I?

Moving on, absorbing Ether increases the size and/or density of the Monster Core, which increases the Monster’s power in turn. And so, 「Ether Absorption」 could be seen as a “Core EXP Collection” Ability. Of course, it’s a bit more complicated, but I digress.

While explaining the subject of Monsters, Charon had made a diagram depicting Ether being funneled into a “Core Ability” in order to “strengthen” the Monster Core. But that was only partially correct.

The true sequence is Ether⟶Core EXP,⟶“Core Capacity” Ability. That ability makes the Monster Core “stronger”, which in turn strengthens the Monster.

How do I know? Because my Race has such an Ability as well, known as 「Zombie Core Capacity」.

Rⅰ

[Zombie Core Capacity Ⅰ]

!!!ERROR: SYSTEM FILES CORRUPTED. CANNOT DISPLAY D://3S.C!!!

Receives Proficiency From:Core EXP can be distributed at a given Ratio of Core EXP to 「Zombie Core Capacity」in accordance to the Rank of 「Zombie Core Capacity」. The Ratios are listed below:

Affects:The User’s Maximum Core EXP will be increased by 100As a Racial Ability, these effects cannot be removed.

Prerequisites for use of the Ability:The User’s Race must be categorized as a Monster

CS = 2,500Command Progress: 0C/ 2,500C

Normally, there would be too many unknowns for me to make sense of the above information. However, for this Ability, there is actually very little information to sort through; in other words, it’s “simple”. Or perhaps “very bare-bones” would be a better way to describe it.

The sole effect of this Ability is to increase the User’s Maximum Core EXP. Thus, I can conclude that all successive Ranks (which seem to go up to a minimum of Roman Numeral 10, judging by the Core EXP obtaining-method) will also increase the “Core Capacity”. There might be other effects as well, but there’s no evidence to support that theory at the moment.

And so: if Core EXP is contributed, the Maximum Core EXP increases. With the Maximum Core EXP increased, the Monster can funnel more Core EXP into other abilities, thus increasing the power of the Monster as a whole.

Now then… Since I’ve splendidly explained Core EXP and how it can strengthen Monsters, I’ll finish off the explanation of 「Ether Absorption」 in short order.

Ether can be absorbed from the Air, Mortal Shells, and other Monster Cores.

Air should be self-explanatory. Just imagine a filtration system leading to a stone. Mh.

For Mortal Shells, the method would essentially consist of using 「Ether Absorption」 on a corpse. Just to clarify, Mortal Shells = Bodies that Mortal Souls are supposed to go into. I’m not sure as to how exactly one can manipulate the absorption to happen on only the Mortal Shell, but I haven’t even met a living Mortal, let alone a corpse of one, so I digress.

I don’t think the bodies really have to be eaten, but it’s likely done anyways — or so is the bias I have towards the word “Monster”. The fact that Charon depicts many Monsters as “devourers of Mortals” also adds to that, but I’ll have to see for myself to be sure.

As for why the Ether from corpses is so special… I don’t know. To begin with, I don’t know what Ether even is. If I were make a random guess: perhaps it has to do with the fact the Mortal Soul is no longer present? Or perhaps, because Mortal Shells can’t use Ether they simply become saturated with it over time.

No matter the reason, it’s listed as a method of absorption.

For absorbing Ether from other Monster Cores, it’s likely done in a similar manner to Mortal Shells, but in its case the entire corpse isn’t needed; just the Core. I’m confident that that’s the case because there’s really no reason to use the corpse.

Ether is stored as Core EXP in the Monster Core whenever a Monster has 「Ether Absorption」 ON (which should be ~99% of the time), so while it’s possible that Ether could be found within a Monster Shell, most of the Ether that it comes into contact with should be going towards their Core immediately. Therefore, the amount of Ether remaining in a Monster’s corpse should be minimal.

The opposite of 「Ether Absorption」, 「Ether Dispersion」 allows a Monster to draw in other Monsters by turning Core EXP into “Dispersed Ether” — which can’t be reabsorbed by the Monster dispersing it. The Dispersed Ether also vanishes over 86,400sec — 24 hours, in other words.

To draw an accurate comparison, 「Ether Dispersion」 creates Monster bait so long as the user has enough Core EXP to actually fuel the Ability. The Monsters that are drawn in are supposedly more pliable while under the influence of the dispersed Ether, but I feel that if the Monster(s) drawn in are stronger than the one dispersing the Ether, being “pliable” simply wouldn’t be enough.

For this reason, use of this Ability is likely exclusive to stronger Monsters. There’s also the fact that it uses Core EXP to function, which weaker Monsters would probably choose to amass and use to advance their abilities.

That being said, ratios of Core EXP:Dispersed Ether can be modified to the ideal 0.01C:1,000C, and that’s only a default limit. I’d go over all the details, but I believe I’ve almost reached 10Deaths, so my attention is needed elsewhere.

You have sustained damage from colliding against a 〖Gravestone〗!HP - 5Your HP has fallen to 0!⟨True Death Count⟩’s Death Count has risen to 10DeathsYou have been revived at Lv.1!The Debuff: ⧼Soul Damage Ⅰ⧽ has been resisted!

With that, I raise my body from beside the Gravestone and dust off my hole-riddled trousers.

Since ⧼Soul Damage⧽ was resisted, it’s time to make a choice. I can:

Continue to kill myself with the Gravestone in order to be 100% sure of how Resistances work

Search for a method to kill myself at a faster pace “”

Make an assumption of my resistance’s capability and:

Abuse it

Avoid it

Ignore it

Hm…

…

…

…

Alright. I’ll choose 3-3.

For my assumption: I’ll assume that I have 100% resistance and am completely immortal from now on — is a thought that I would normally retort as jumping the gun, but this time it’s exactly as it appears.

I’m not making this assumption lightly, of course. The reason why I’m willing to assume such a ridiculous thing is because it doesn’t matter even if the assumption is wrong.

Let’s say I become arrogant and hunt Dragons at Lv.1. Let’s say that said Dragons can destroy my Soul somehow. If they can, it doesn’t matter. I had planned to embrace nonexistence as soon as I left Earth, so in the end it’ll just end as planned.

That being said, I don’t plan on becoming arrogant. I’ve never been one for baseless bravado.

Rather than that, I should set a firm foundation for what I’ll do from now on. At least in this life I don’t want be faced with the sole choice of “Surviving”. If I can’t die, then I want to “live” — I want to have a purpose.

So let’s take a short inventory.

I’ve been given a Command that is of no use to me at my current location: ⟨Reading Mastery⟩, a over-dramatized Command which was gained through a skill honed in my previous life for the sake of guilt alleviation: ⟨Oracle’s Eye⟩, and a contradictory cheat-like Command that’s made me immortal despite choosing death: ⟨The Choice of the True Dead⟩.

I also have a handful of Abilities obtained through my birth as a Monster, as well as a handful of Byproduct Commands from the “Blessings”.

Some of my Commands look quite dangerous, and others look so plain that I can’t help but yawn reading over them.

I have no doubt that I could go off and find new Commands and neglect all of the Commands I’ve received, but the “Newborn” Title would make me advance a bit too quickly, so I’d have to live in solitude without doing anything until the Title disappears if I wished to live a completely new life.

I don’t plan on doing such a thing, however.

I’ll choose to focus on the one of the three Blessings that I received. An ability that’s Rare, one that would make the average citizen could simply say “Ah, it’s because they have that Command, so it can’t be helped.” An ability that I can feel useful with. One that I’ve at least contributed some effort to learn.

⟨Oracle’s Eye⟩

While it’s odd that it was so overly dramatized, my dedication to reading the possible outcomes of interactions did lead to this Skill, and it’s closer to being “earned” than a simple year of Reading or committing suicide while accepting the possibility of nonexistence.

Furthermore, for ⟨The Choice of the True Dead⟩ in particular: all of its direct Byproducts are for Combat.

Let it be known that I’m not a battle-junkie by any means, so embracing this Skill would be nothing but troublesome.

Considering the fact that this body is still quite cheat-like all on its own, being reincarnated with just⟨Oracle’s Eye⟩ would be ideal… But that’s impossible. Even if reincarnation happened so conveniently, the current me is “immortal”, so it can’t be helped.

But I don’t want to remain immortal forever.

“If you could live forever, would you?” is a question I heard often on Earth, but no matter how many times it was asked, my answer would always remain “No”. Watching everyone around you wither away, seeing countries rise and fall, and being forced to remain a spectator or risk becoming a subject of cruel experimentation… Who would choose such a fate?

That’s why, until an opportunity to rid myself of immortality comes I will live as an Oracle. In games, Oracles are usually of the “Holy” paradigm, and the Skill’s attribute is Holy here, too, so I’m sure I can explain my longevity as a gift from a God if the situation arises. Mh.

Anyways, the description of ⟨Oracle’s Eye⟩ said that Oracles come in times of great change, so even though I didn’t ask for the Skill assisting the people of Ariot with whatever “change” is to come is as good a reason to live as any.

That being said, I have many things I still don’t understand about Ariot, and sitting around in a Graveyard won’t change that.

I turn back towards my makeshift Guidebook+Cloak stool — which is slightly disheveled after I took the Cloak off of it to read over the Book earlier — and pick up the Cloak. I wrap one of its arms over my shoulder and knot the arms together. With that, I make a makeshift “Purse” to hold the Book.

Wearing the Cloak is just asking to trip over it sooner or later, so it might as well hold the Guidebook instead. I don’t have the cheat-like “Item Box” Command, so this is as close as I’ll get to moving around freely.

Just as I think so, one of the knots used to hold the Guidebook becomes undone and the Book promptly falls to the ground with a slight *thump*.

Life(?) is already coming off to a pleasant start.

※ ※ ※

Ensig:
I feel like a teacher after writing all of that. It might be a bit boring, but it’s important stuff, so… There’s no helping it.

10 thoughts on “Chapter 5: The Guidebook and the Gravestone”

Thanks for the translation (my gosh each chapter is long) – right now all I can say is were now 5 chapters in and still nothing has happen yet. I do like the gender bender twist but I’m not sure what role it will have with the story unless this is another Re:Monster style story.

I know you know that you are over-explaining things, and I know it’s for characterization reasons. I still had to skim big portions of the last couple chapters. It’s not irrelevant, it’s just hard to read…

I continue to have a weird feeling whenever she says something like “xxx — is not a thought I had”. It’s not like actually has someone else talking to her, right?

“An ability that’s Rare, one that would make the average citizen could simply say “Ah, it’s because they have that Command, so it can’t be helped.”” There is an extraneous “could” in that sentence.